Published: Saturday, January 4, 2014 at 03:29 PM.

That has as much to do with his upbringing as it does the position he plays on Florida State’s football team.

Lovelady is a former Navarre standout and a reserve lineman with the Seminoles, and he and his teammates are gearing up for Monday night’s BCS Championship against Auburn in the Rose Bowl in Pasadena, Calif. The contest kicks off at 7:30 p.m. CST.

“It didn’t hit me until today with the media and all that,” Lovelady said of the enormity of the pending game between the two teams.

Lovelady, a 6-foot-3, 290-pound junior, has appeared in 11 games this season, largely in mop-up duty in the Seminoles’ many blowout victories. He’s a versatile player who can step in at any position along FSU’s offensive line, and he’s awaiting his chance to crack the starting lineup within one of the team’s most experienced positional groups.

Born in Auburn, Ala., Lovelady grew up in a household in which his mother was an executive in the health care industry and his father was an auto-body repairman. After moving to Navarre and completing his high school career, Lovelady’s parents eventually moved to Daytona Beach.

Lovelady said he was given little choice but to learn how to work on cars, particularly those that his dad brought home to fix up.

That has as much to do with his upbringing as it does the position he plays on Florida State’s football team.

Lovelady is a former Navarre standout and a reserve lineman with the Seminoles, and he and his teammates are gearing up for Monday night’s BCS Championship against Auburn in the Rose Bowl in Pasadena, Calif. The contest kicks off at 7:30 p.m. CST.

“It didn’t hit me until today with the media and all that,” Lovelady said of the enormity of the pending game between the two teams.

Lovelady, a 6-foot-3, 290-pound junior, has appeared in 11 games this season, largely in mop-up duty in the Seminoles’ many blowout victories. He’s a versatile player who can step in at any position along FSU’s offensive line, and he’s awaiting his chance to crack the starting lineup within one of the team’s most experienced positional groups.

Born in Auburn, Ala., Lovelady grew up in a household in which his mother was an executive in the health care industry and his father was an auto-body repairman. After moving to Navarre and completing his high school career, Lovelady’s parents eventually moved to Daytona Beach.

Lovelady said he was given little choice but to learn how to work on cars, particularly those that his dad brought home to fix up.

“I was raised that way,” he said, noting that he drove a 1999 Cadillac De Ville in high school that he and his father restored. “We didn’t own a new car until my mom bought one herself. She was tired of” driving restored cars.

Lovelady was an early enrollee when he committed to Florida State, and he is on pace to graduate with a degree in criminology this spring. He said he will begin a master’s program next fall and has given thought to entering law school.

Lovelady may have been born in Auburn, but he said playing at FSU was a “dream come true” and gave his parents an opportunity to see him play at home regularly. Two days removed from the biggest game of his life, he said the offensive line must play well to keep the Seminole offense clicking.

The Tigers’ defense is ranked just 88th in the nation in total defense, surrendering 423 yards per game. Auburn was good enough on that side of the ball to collective consecutive must-wins against Georgia, Alabama and Missouri down the stretch, however. FSU players have said all week that Auburn’s defense is better than the numbers indicate, and Lovelady said the same thing.

“It’s a great group, and they have a really strong front four,” he said. “They have good linebackers. They’re definitely one of the best defenses we’ve seen all year.”